by A. C. Cobble
Gallen hugged himself tighter and walked over to the window of the apothecary, peering inside where the duke and the strange girl he’d brought were still investigating the scene.
“You knew the man, sir,” pressed McCready. “What did the apothecary have to do with a countess — with sorcery?”
The senior inspector spun, stabbing a finger toward McCready. “You trying to take my job, Inspector?”
McCready frowned. “No, of course not. If I wanted to do that… Sir, I’m just asking — how was the apothecary involved? Why was the countess murdered in Harwick, in this building? It has a unique architecture, but—”
“Coincidence,” snapped Gallen.
“If the Duke finds out about your peculiar interests, he’s going to have a hard time not thinking it’s somehow related to this murder, m’lord.”
“If he finds out,” growled Gallen.
McCready eyed his supervisor, watching the man’s nervous shuffling, his angry glare. The senior inspector had turned from the building and was facing McCready head on, his arms still crossed over his chest. The dead apothecary, Holmes, had been Gallen’s sometimes business partner and friend, or at least, McCready thought he had been. Gallen showed little sorrow at the man’s violent death, though. The only concern he displayed was for his position if the investigation turned on him. The senior inspector was a political animal, a ladder climber, no doubt, but this was his friend. If McCready didn’t know the man better…
“He’s a victim in all of this, just like the countess,” growled the senior inspector. “Whoever killed her was surely the same perpetrator who murdered him. You want to keep your job, McCready, you find out who it was. We get a name, and we’ll keep the duke happy.”
“Who and why,” suggested McCready.
“Find out who, and why will be apparent,” snapped Gallen. He glanced back inside the window of the apothecary. “Go back inside, Pat, and assist in whatever way you can. I’m going to the office and will update the report. Let’s keep my relationship with Holmes between the two of us, at least until we find some relevant evidence. No need to have the duke chasing leads that go nowhere. I’ll send a carriage around to take them to the mortuary when the physician has had time to get it unlocked.”
“We don’t know anything yet, sir,” challenged McCready. “What are you going to put into the report?”
“You think they want to hear that in Eastundon, that we don’t know anything?” barked Gallen. “Royalty is involved. If I don’t send regular reports to provincial leadership every few turns of the clock, they’ll be coming up here themselves, and that is the last thing we need. You handle matters here, Pat. We both know you’re better at the investigation bit than I am, and I’ll manage the politics. We handle this right, and neither one of us has to worry. If leadership or that spirit-forsaken duke gets upset, though…”
“Understood, sir,” responded McCready. He watched his supervisor as the man hurried off into the darkness.
The Priestess II
“What was the ritual intended to do?” asked Duke.
She drummed her fingers on the hilt of her kris before responding, “Contact the spirits of the dead… force them to perform an act for the sorcerer or divulge knowledge. Honestly, I don’t know. My mentor has taught me the signs, but I’ve never seen anything like this in person.”
“Contact the spirits of the dead and make them… It was really sorcery, you think?” wondered Duke. “I thought…”
“That’s what dark magic is,” explained Sam. “In sorcery, the practitioner calls upon the underworld spirits. Using rituals to invoke power over the shades, they bind them. They use that binding to compel their service. Depending on the ritual, the skill of the sorcerer, and the spirit they’ve called, there are a number of things they could do. Some are truth, we know. Some are only rumored…”
Duke frowned skeptically. “I was told sorcery is gone from Enhover.”
“Magic, based on the spirits of life, is gone,” explained Sam. “The connection between people and the spirits of the living world was severed in Enhover decades ago. Severed because of the rise of technology, severed because people just turned their backs on it, or maybe something else. No one knows for sure. We do know there are no more druids in Enhover, and there have not been any in our lifetimes. There is still death, though. Death is everywhere, and it only takes someone knowledgeable to call upon the underworld.”
“How come we never hear about this, then?” challenged Duke. “If all it takes is a sorcerer, surely there would be some? Once the knowledge has been discovered, it’s always there, right?”
“Unless it is suppressed, somehow,” agreed Sam.
“The Church?” speculated Duke, looking at her out of the corner of his eye. “Is that why the bishop sent you with me, to suppress knowledge of what happened here? If the Church is acting in Enhover without my family’s knowledge or permission…”
“Would you allow sorcerers to roam freely?” asked Sam.
“No, I—”
“Carriage is here,” said Inspector McCready from the doorway.
“We’ll talk later,” muttered Duke.
Sam shrugged and allowed him to lead her into the cold night.
McCready was standing by the door of a sturdy-looking carriage. Sam was surprised to see a horse attached to it.
“Not enough mechanical carriages in Harwick?” she asked.
The inspector rolled his shoulders. “Not that our office can afford.”
Duke paused and glanced back at the apothecary.
“What?” Sam asked him.
“I think we’ve been going about this wrong.”
“How so?” inquired McCready.
“I certainly don’t know enough about occult rituals to determine anything from what we’ve found inside,” responded Duke. “That’s a mystery to us all, but there have been no reports of odd happenings, have there?”
McCready shook his head. “Aside from the crime itself, nothing unusual at all, m’lord.”
“Countess Dalyrimple got here, though, somehow,” continued Duke. “She traveled from Archtan Atoll, likely into Southundon, and then to Harwick. Surely there are records of her journey — records from the rail, records from the airship or vessel when it arrived from Archtan Atoll. If we find how and when she got to Enhover and then to Harwick, we can narrow down her movements and perhaps find who knew she was here and who was around her.”
“It’s a good thought, m’lord,” agreed McCready. “I’ve already checked the passenger manifests for all inbound rail over the last two weeks, though. Any earlier and I think there’d be some sign she was in the village. No one resembling the countess was listed on the first-class rosters, and unfortunately, they don’t take names for tickets in the public coaches.”
Duke frowned. “Airship or vessel manifests, then. We should be able to figure out when she arrived in Enhover, if not into Harwick. It’s a place to start.”
“Those are Company records,” replied McCready. “The Company won’t release that kind of thing. Not to some village inspector, at least.”
“They will to me,” assured Duke. “I suggest instead of the crematorium we head to the glae worm station. I’ll dash off a note over the filament to Company House in Southundon. Within a week or two, we’ll have the records of every vessel that arrived from Archtan Atoll in the last several months, and any passengers will be listed on the manifest of the voyage. If the countess arrived on a Company ship, and I don’t see how she could otherwise, we’ll find out which one.”
Sam’s breath puffed in cold autumn night, drifting in front of her as the men talked. She studied the dark, lantern-lit streets of Harwick. At night, in the dim light, the gray granite of the buildings and the cobbles blended into each other, and then into the surrounding hills and cliffs, and then into the sky. Only the lichen and the moss stood out, giving the place some personality. A damp, depressing personality, but the little bit of life was more cheerful tha
n grim stone and darkness.
She stepped around the carriage, eyeing the horse. It was rare to see one in Westundon, and the beast was fascinating to her. Tall, its shoulder near the height of her head, and powerful. Muscles rippled under a glossy coat as the creature shifted beneath the light atop the carriage.
“Whoa there,” whispered the driver, leaning forward to pat the rump of the animal. “Nothing to be afraid of.”
The horse shifted again then pranced to the side, whinnying loudly. The driver nearly lost his balance, only his grip on his seat preventing him from pitching forward onto the back of the horse. The beast danced ahead, pulling against its traces, dragging the carriage a hand forward despite the squeal of the brakes.
“Weapons out!” cried Sam, spinning toward Duke and McCready.
The inspector just stared at her, his truncheon hanging untouched on his belt while she drew her two kris daggers. Duke was quicker, and in a blink, the heavy steel of his broadsword slid from the leather scabbard.
“What is it?” he hissed, his eyes darting back and forth, peering into the night.
She didn’t answer. Instead, she centered herself, drew a deep breath, and in a slow, steady release, breathed out. Barely visible in the darkness, her clouded breath billowed in front of her then twitched to her left. She twirled, whipping one of her kris daggers around and flinging it without looking for a target. The blade spun and, with a thump, impacted the wood of the carriage door.
McCready eyed the dagger which had flashed by a pace to his left. Then, he screamed as a gleaming tip of steel punched through his chest.
Uttering a stream of unintelligible curses, Duke leapt toward the inspector, slashing past the man, but she knew the nobleman couldn’t see his target.
The steel of his broadsword made an unmistakable sound as it clanged against iron. Duke’s eyes widened in surprise. He lashed the blade in front of him frantically, trying to strike an invisible assailant.
Sam darted past the flailing duke, and with her open hand, she grabbed the shaft of a blackened spear and then slammed her kris dagger into a cloaked body.
A grunt, a pained wheeze, and she felt their assailant struggling to pull the spear from her grasp. She yanked out her kris and stabbed again. The tug on the spear weakened and then stopped. The cloaked shape fell back, landing heavily on the damp cobblestone street.
“What the frozen hell was that!” shouted Duke.
She stood, shaking, her bloody kris in one hand, and she realized, a harpoon in the other. It wasn’t a weapon at all, really, but it had been effective.
“You, on the carriage, bring the light!” instructed Duke. She heard him scrambling behind her. “Frozen hell, the inspector is dead. The alarm, man, raise the alarm!”
Shouts and questions rose as concerned citizens threw open windows and peeked out doors. The light from the carriage swayed wildly behind her as the driver struggled to comply with Duke’s frantic, contradictory instructions.
In front of her, in the dancing shadows from the lantern, she saw the face of the man she’d killed. A man. It wasn’t a woman or something worse. The cold knowledge did nothing to slow the churning boil in her stomach. She’d killed someone with her dagger. A person, not a spirit. It wasn’t a friendly sparring match. It wasn’t a straw dummy her mentor had set for her. It was a person who was gone now.
A hand rested on her shoulder.
“Are you all right?” asked Duke quietly.
“I will be,” she breathed.
“This is the first time you have killed a man?”
She looked over her shoulder, up his arm, and saw him staring at the body.
“A man, yes, my first,” she mumbled.
“I won’t lie,” he said, turning to meet her eyes. “It is going to keep you up at night for a bit. If it helps, and I know it may not, you saved my life tonight.”
She looked past him to McCready. The inspector was on his side, his eyes wide in shock. A trickle of blood leaked from his open mouth, collecting on his bushy mustache then dripping to the dark cobblestones. From the puddle around him, a fountain of it must have spilled from his chest where the harpoon rammed through his body. It clipped his heart, she guessed, making it quick at least.
“You couldn’t have done anything for him,” said Duke. “I don’t know — I don’t know what just happened. I couldn’t see a damned thing. All I saw was the inspector screaming and iron sticking out of him. Even when I attacked, I was just swinging. I hit something, but I never saw this man until you killed him.”
“He was wearing black,” offered Sam in explanation. She tossed the harpoon onto the cobbles and knelt beside Duke to examine their attacker.
Down the street, shouts and stomping feet heralded the arrival of McCready’s companions in the watch. They would handle his body, and she was certain Senior Inspector Gallen would be in charge of a new investigation. Before he arrived, she wanted to see who she had killed.
“Do you think he was attempting to assassinate me?” wondered Duke.
She frowned. “Why would he… right, you’re a son of the king.”
“If he’d come at me first…” murmured the nobleman, “I didn’t even know he was there.”
“Why didn’t he, if that’s what he was after?” she asked.
They both frowned and turned to look at their attacker.
The man was short, even shorter than her, and in the flickering light of the carriage driver’s lantern, he was dark, his face weathered from exposure to the elements. On his face were swirling tattoos, drawn across his forehead in place of his eyebrows. His cloak was plain, and underneath it, he wore simple trousers, shirt, and a wool jacket — attire that wouldn’t be out of place on the streets of Harwick or Westundon as long as he painted over the archaic script that made up his eyebrows. His pockets were empty, and he carried no purse, no objects, nothing but the cloak, the clothes, and the harpoon.
“In his ears, those piercings along the top,” remarked Duke. “They’re typical of sailors in the Vendatt Islands and Archtan Atoll. It’s a safe assumption the man worked the tropics at some point.”
Pursing her lips, she picked up the harpoon and turned it. The haft was simple wood, painted black, except where Duke’s blade had cut out a finger-wide chip. The tip was iron, further blackened by soot to hide it in the dark. She wiped the point on the dead man’s clothing, rubbing away the ash and blood, revealing small, intricate runes. The metal was roughly gouged where she cleaned away the soot. Freshly carved, possibly done earlier that evening.
“That’s strange,” remarked Duke.
“Not that strange,” replied Sam.
Using the dead man’s cloak, she wiped her kris clean as well and showed it to him. Along the edge, small symbols had been etched into the steel. Over the years and countless sharpening, many of them had been rubbed away, but they were still recognizable enough she knew that even in the dim light, Duke would see the similarities.
“What—”
“What happened?” cried a voice. They turned and saw Senior Inspector Gallen standing over the body of his subordinate. “He… Is he dead?”
Nodding her head in the direction of the inspector, Sam whispered to Duke, “I’ll tell you later.”
“Gallen,” barked Duke, turning to face the man. “Yes, Inspector McCready is dead. He was killed by this man.”
“I don’t… I don’t understand,” babbled the senior inspector.
Duke pointed to the corpse at his feet. “Do you recognize this person?”
The senior inspector gaped at him.
“Look at him, Gallen,” instructed Duke. “He killed your inspector. Do you recognize him?”
“I-I… No,” stammered the senior inspector.
Sighing, Duke turned to the carriage driver and waved him over.
“A whaler,” said the man, standing beside his horse, trying to calm the creature. “I’ve seen him down in the taverns. Can’t miss those markings on his face.”
&nb
sp; “A local, then?” wondered Sam, surprised.
“He wasn’t born in Harwick, no,” replied the driver. “He’s been around for a bit, though. Had those markings when he showed up. He keeps to himself, bit of a drinker. Can’t tell you where he lives or who his friends are, if he has any.”
“You know he’s a whaler, though?” questioned Duke. “There must be something else you can tell us.”
The driver glanced meaningfully at Gallen then turned back to Duke.
Duke turned to the man. “Inspector…”
“I don’t know him!” cried Gallen, wringing his hands. He glared at the driver. “A whaler, you say?”
“Could be he works for Merchant Robertson,” muttered the driver, his voice barely audible over the sounds of the watchmen arriving on the scene. Rubbing the back of his hand across his lips, and flicking his eyes at Gallen, the driver added, “Worked for, I mean.”
“Where can we find Merchant Robertson?” asked Duke, looking between the two of them.
Neither the driver nor the inspector answered.
Duke growled and took a step toward Gallen. “Where can we find Merchant Robertson, Inspector Gallen?”
The man was trembling, refusing to meet the duke’s eyes.
“In a village this size, surely you know every prominent merchant?” questioned Sam. “What are you hiding?”
Gallen swallowed uncomfortably and shifted his weight. “I, ah, I do know Merchant Robertson. He and I are both members of an… an organization. That has nothing to do with this. Patrick McCready was my best inspector! It’s just, ah, this group—”
“A secret society,” guessed the nobleman. “Which one?”
“Mouth of Set,” whispered Gallen.
Sam swallowed, the name sending a shudder down her spine.
“Mouth of Set,” said Duke, rubbing his chin, studying the portly inspector. “You’ll get us in.”
“I-I…”
“That wasn’t a question, Inspector.”
The Cartographer III